Twitter blocks #bisexual with new rules, but gives Trump a pass to bully & abuse people

On Friday, Twitter updated its search filters and clarified its rules.

The updates to the search filters led to the social media platform blocking searches for LGBTQ words, “gay,” “lesbian,” “bisexual,” and “transsexual.” Searches for those terms led to a “no results” message.

Twitter has said that the issue is an “error,” but has not explained what the error was.

Last Friday, though, Twitter published a blog post to “clarify” its rules. In the post, the company wrote that it would be making its ban on “adult content” more clear this month, and it’s possible that LGBT terms are getting caught in a ban on NSFW content.

Twitter may have just explained why Donald Trump can be abusive but you can’t

The blog post also discussed abusive behavior, explaining why some cases of abusive behavior will not result in suspended accounts. One sentence appears to be a loophole for famous people who want to use Twitter as a platform for abuse:

We are making it clear that context — including if the behavior is targeted, if a report has been filed and by whom, and if the Tweet itself is newsworthy and in the legitimate public interest — is crucial when evaluating abusive behavior and determining appropriate enforcement actions.

The word “newsworthy” is a hyperlink to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary‘s entry for the term, which provides little information about what exactly Twitter means.

While the first two parts of “context” affect how abusive a comment is, whether it’s “newsworthy” or not may have nothing to do with how abusive it is.

In fact, a Tweet might be newsworthy specifically because it is abusive. A famous person saying that a colleague is wonderful is a “dog bites man” story, but that famous person calling the same colleague a fuckchop is news.

By exempting “newsworthy” tweets its behavior policy, Twitter may be providing itself with an excuse to not suspend Trump’s account, even when he does things that would get other users suspended.

Twitter’s motivations here – to clean up the cesspool of abuse and harassment published on their platform, but also to keep people engaged with their platform in part because they want to see what horrible thing Trump will say next – are in conflict. Stepping up actions against abusive behavior while providing what appears to be an unbiased reason for exempting abusive behavior that brings in traffic might be Twitter’s way of walking that fine line.

While Twitter has not commented on what caused this error, some users have speculated that search filters intended to block pornography are also blocking searches for bisexuality.

“Every bi activist knows the problems of trying to search for bi content on the web – some public wifi systems block it altogether, even when it’s nothing to do with sex, because bisexual is seen as a dodgy word in itself,” bisexual activist Kate Harrad told Gay Star News.